SSH + gzip + pv + pipes = copying files from remote boxen

1. SSH into a remote box and execute a command ssh bob@some-server.example.com "command"
2. The "command" to execute dumps a file to std out cat my-app.sql, then compress that stream back to STDOUT | gzip -c
3. Pipe the compressed stream through your local machine and get some stats and transfer status | pv
4. Decompress the stream on the fly | gunzip
5. Redirect the stream to a file on your local machine > tmp/my-app.sql

Putting it all together:

$ ssh bob@some-sever.example.com "cat my-app.sql | gzip -c" | pv | gunzip > tmp/my-app.sql

Behold, UNIX!